BPS organizations and structures

It is potentially very complex deciding which groups to include and which to exclude, though there is benefit in knowing about some groups affiliations they may not fit in with this thread’s initial intent, for example …

• Sussex & Kent ME/CFS Society: this has a disproportionate number of medical advisors when compared to other regional or even national charities (Prof Leslie J Findley, Dr Alan Stewart, Prof Neil Harrison, Prof Esther Crawley, Dr Alistair Miller & Dr Jessica Eccles see https://measussex.org.uk/about-us/medical-advisors/ ). Why does a local South East group have such high profile medical advisors from across the country? Is this the only local group defending the CBT/GET paradigm?
• Cochrane: if discussion on the thread about the current petition is heading in the right direction (https://www.s4me.info/threads/petit...rapy-for-cfs-review.35109/page-11#post-497770 ) does this mean that Cochrane was established with a built in BPS bias?

 

Yes.

And no, mostly via a trick.

The goal of the EAPM is to make and keep psychiatry involved in medical treatment via mostly CBT, and for this they have to keep up and justify an approach (the psychosomatic approach, bps) that portrays psyche as the determining factor in illness, particularly the illnesses they have built their movement on, ME being its flagship. It's a mix of disablist ideology and a cold hard industry game plan to conquer and expand territory/market. But at the same time they have to keep up a balancing act: they want to treat these things with psychiatric treatment (CBT) and like there is no actual or appreciable pathology going on. But they also don't want their targets to be seen as psychiatric cases (despite treating them that way)because they need their approaches to be seen as on par with medical treatment, having an effect on physical disability and severe disabling physical symptoms. So while their movement is built on rehashed narrative of victorian neuroses -hypochondria and hysteria- this is all hidden behind what you recently so eloquiently called "a rhetorical mirage" of bps bullshittery.

Psychogenic means that something is due to psychic, mental or emotional factors and not to detectable organic or somatic factors.

You'd think that sums up the bps movement's view of illnesses like ME, but it also emphasises the cause as psychological in the name.

genesis means "the origin of something, when it is begun or starts to exist" (Cambr. dic.) As a suffix, -genesis means 1. origin, or 2. production (wiktionary) Following that, psychogenic means originating from, or produced by, psychological factors.


The trick that is played in the bps movement is, like I explain here at the bottom of this post, one of time. They make a linear time difference between what has been the trigger of ME, which is allowed to be a viral infection, and what is causing the symptoms and disability now, which according to their beliefs is wrong cognitions and behaviour, psychiatry territory.

It's why they can say things like "applying a cognitive-behavioral approach to the treatment of post-COVID-19 fatigue does neither imply that its cause is psychological nor does it negate a possible somatic cause" without blinking.

 

I'm gonna give this a rest for the time being. I think there have been a lot of very helpful commentaries on this thread, but it's also made me realize that this is too big a project for me to take on in my current state. I still think it's a worthwhile thing to lay out just how much overlap there is between different organizations of the BPS-crew. I just can't manage it right now.

If anyone else is able and willing to pursue this, I think this thread could serve as a good starting points with all the tips laid out in this thread by several people.

 

Twitter/X won't let me post these links so posting here:




The irony!

EAPM (European Association of Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry, Psychosomatic Medicine and Integrated Care), for which Prof M Sharpe is current President will hold its annual conference in June:


EAMP24 Conference Program (Wed 13 - Sat 15 June):

https://www.eapm.eu.com/
https://www.eapm.eu.com/eapm24-program/


Master classes

(...)

MC.2 Clinical interventions for long Covid – Gerd Kvale (Forum thread on psychologist Prof Gerd Kvale)


Symposia (75min session)

(...)

Unveiling hope: Redefining long-term fatigue including long covid and CFS/ME. Helena Liira, presenters: Per Fink, Maria Pedersen, Anna-Karin Norlin, Live Landmark


Full Program PDF: https://www.eapm.eu.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/EAPM2024_ProgramV_FS-nm-29.01.24-2.pdf

 

"Unveiling hope"

Oh, the irony

 

I remember when I started work over 40 years ago how doctors hated telling people they had MND (ALS) because there was no treatment, which resulted in false hope and people failing to plan for their inevitable deterioration. This dramatically reduced their quality of life as things were never in place to support them until too late.

Toxic positivity helps no one, and prevents people achieving their best quality of life in their current circumstances. The BPS crew are obsessed with giving people hope, even though false hope does no one any good.

 

Never knew unveiling was a synonym for destroying. Learn something new every day....